How to play Dartle
Dartle is a daily trivia game shaped like a darts checkout. Every day there's one category, and every answer in it is worth a number. Name up to 3 answers whose numbers add up to exactly 100. Everyone in the world gets the same category, and a new one unlocks at midnight in your time zone.
The rules
- Read the category. It tells you what each answer is worth: a president's number, an element's atomic number, a country's population rank, a film's position in a ranking. In a ranking, #1 is worth just 1 point.
- Throw a dart. Type an answer and pick it from the list. Its value is revealed and added to your total.
- Hit 100 exactly. A total of exactly 100 is a bullseye. Go over 100 and you bust, which scores 0.
- Or stand. After any dart you can stand and keep your total. Close to 100 still beats a bust.
- Up to 3 darts. Each answer can be used once. After your last dart, your total is your score.
A higher score wins. If two players tie, the one who used fewer darts wins, so a bullseye in two darts beats one in three.
The redemption shot
On some days, one answer in the category is worth exactly 100 on its own. On those days, busting earns you one extra dart: name that answer and you still hit the bullseye. It's up to you to work out which answer it is.
A worked example
Puzzle #1 was US presidents by number, where each answer is worth its president number. One way to hit 100:
- Dart 1: Franklin Delano Roosevelt, worth 32
- Dart 2: Harry S. Truman, worth 33
- Dart 3: John F. Kennedy, worth 35
32 + 33 + 35 = 100. Bullseye. After two darts the total was 65, so the last dart needed to be worth exactly 35. Anything bigger would have busted. There were 140 different ways to hit 100 that day, counting one-, two- and three-dart finishes.
Strategy tips
- Start with something you're sure about. A first dart whose value you can guess fairly well tells you how much room you have left.
- Do the subtraction. Before the last dart, work out exactly what you need. Then think of answers near that number.
- Watch out for big values. Some answers are worth more than 100 on their own. Throw one and you bust straight away.
- Standing is fine. If you're on 94 with one dart left and can't think of a 6, standing on 94 beats a bust.
- Read the notes. Each category explains its edge cases, like how ties, merged entries or renamed teams are counted.
Where the numbers come from
Every category is built from a published source, such as Wikipedia, an official body or a well-known dataset, and the source is linked on the puzzle. See how Dartle is made or browse every past category.